Archaeological Sites

Young Turkish Team

Turkey’s underwater heritage has been explored since the nineteen sixties by Prof. George Bass, who then founded the Institute of Nautical Archaeology (INA). For a couple of years now a young Turkish team, conducted by Prof. Dr. Nergis Gunsenin, has identified sixteen archaeological sites during its surveys around the Marmara islands. Eight of these carried Ganos type amphoras(Gunsenin type 1 amphoras). Ganos which is today’s Gaziköy (situated along the north shore of the Sea of Marmara), within the order of Tekirdag  One of them, Tekmezar I was one of the biggest vessels of the Byzantine period, a muriophoros with a cargo size of about 20,000 amphoras, estimated weight of the cargo is about 200 tones. Another was laden with cargo of roof tiles; another of water pipes; another was filled with Yassi Ada-globular type ( INA excavations); another wreck, carried the last amphoras of maritime commerce; wreck of ÇAMALTI BURNU I. Yet another recent discovery containing architectural marbles. The importance of this wreck is that, it is the first discovery of a cargo of marble presumably coming from the nearby marble quarries of the Marmara Island in Late Antiquity. Detailed reports of the results of the underwater surveys have been presented  orally in various international congress and many articles have been published in scientific journals. At this point to go any further we need to excavate.

Gunsenin Type Anphoras

Ganos (Gazikoy)

Tekmezar

Roof Tiles

Water Pipes

Architectural Marbles

Marmara Islands